Tag Archives: State Department

International news

Islamic state takes 'credit' for Garland attack

Bet on this: If the State Department and the spooks at the CIA prove that the Islamic State actually is responsible for the Garland shooting involving the “Muhammad cartoon contest,” we’ll hear from those who will contend that the terrorists have infiltrated the United States.

Except that the White House says it’s too early to know whether the terrorist monsters can legitimately claim credit for the shooting.

http://news.yahoo.com/claims-texas-attack-via-official-radio-station-084314386.html

This brings to mind something I consider whenever I hear such claims of credit.

Can anyone make such a claim? Just because the Islamic State says it’s responsible for something, are we supposed to assume the worst instinctively?

Two Muslims opened fire in Garland when a right-wing group sponsored a “contest” for illustrations showing the Islamic prophet Muhammad, which is offensive under Islamic tenets. The sponsoring group knew that it was offensive, but it sponsored the event anyway, provoking the two men to open fire.

Garland police shot them both to death on the spot.

The Islamic State is taking credit for it. Did the terrorist hierarchy order the men to open fire?

I prefer to wait for proof that the terrorist cult is responsible before believing what it says.

These hideous monsters are capable of saying — let alone doing — anything.

International news, national news, political news

Benghazi report timing is, um, dubious

This shouldn’t surprise anyone.

The U.S. House Select Committee on Benghazi will release its report to the world sometime in, that’s correct, 2016. That’s right smack in the midst of a presidential campaign featuring the No. 1 principal in that investigation, former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who — by the way — will be running for president of the United States.

I know. You just can’t believe the timing of it all, right?

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/04/house-benghazi-report-release-2016-117231.html?hp=r3_4

The panel’s chairman, Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, had wanted to release the report no later than the end of the current year. Legal staffers, though, said they needed more time to assimilate everything and compile into a comprehensive report on what happened on Sept. 11, 2012 at the U.S. consulate in Libya.

What did happen? Some terrorists launched an attack on the consulate, a fire fight ensued and four Americans were killed, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya. Clinton’s State Department has been accused of covering up key elements relating to what they knew and when they knew it. Previous findings have concluded there has been no deliberate cover-up. But the Republican-led House launched a select committee probe anyway.

This is certain to muddy Clinton’s presidential campaign, particularly if it produces a proverbial “smoking gun.”

What did she know? When did she know it? Did the secretary deliberately mislead Americans?

I’ve long thought this congressional panel already had pre-determined culpability, but was looking for the path that would reach that conclusion. Then again, I’m not in the hearts and minds of those who are conducting this investigation.

I’ll accept Chairman Gowdy’s assertion that he wanted to release the report prior to the election year.

My hope now is that we can choose the next president on the merits of their full public record, their campaign rhetoric and their pledges to lead the country toward an even brighter future.

My fear is that the Benghazi report is going to plow all of that noble intent into the ground.

 

national news, political news

E-mail controversy isn't yet a 'scandal'

Hillary Clinton’s e-mail dustup just won’t go away.

Former House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., had sent the former secretary of state a letter asking about her use of a personal e-mail account. Clinton didn’t respond.

Fox News Channel’s “crawl” across the TV screen, quite naturally, referred to it as a “scandal.”

Hold on. We’re not there. We may never get there.

This is what happens, though, when a candidate declares his or her intention to run for high office. In this case, it’s the highest office in the most powerful country on Earth.

Thus, the e-mail matter is going to keep boiling and roiling.

Is it a “scandal,” which the right-wing mainstream media want to describe it? No. It’s a controversy that needs some more fleshing out.

Clinton admits to using a personal e-mail account to do public business while running the State Department. That was a dumb call. She should have used the government account, which was hers to use. But she wasn’t the first high-ranking Cabinet official to rely on personal e-mail accounts.

Has anyone thought to subpoena former secretaries of state Colin Powell and Condi Rice? Oh, I forgot. They aren’t running for president … nor are they Democrats.

Let’s cool our jets here. Controversy? Yes. Scandal? Not even close.

 

national news, political news

Sen. Paul: most interesting GOP candidate

I’ll lay my bet down now that Rand Paul is going to be the most interesting and provocative Republican running for president in 2016.

I didn’t like the U.S. senator from Kentucky when he first burst onto the scene. I like him better now. It’s not that I plan to vote for him next year if he gets the GOP nomination. He does have some interesting ideas to share with Americans.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/republican-rand-paul-announces-2016-presidential-run-on-website/ar-AAaxxuJ

He’s already announced on his website that he’s going to run. He has an event planned later today in his home state to make official.

He wants to return the nation to the “principles of liberty and limited government.”

Well, damn! Isn’t that original?

Actually, though, his view of libertarianism encompasses a wide swath of issues.

He suggests favoring marijuana legalization. I’m wondering what he’s going to say down the line about assisted suicide and abortion. His foreign policy doctrine looks to be of an anti-war bent, unlike so many of the TEA party members of his party who seem all too willing to start dropping bombs and (please pardon this hideous euphemism) placing American “boots on the ground” to assist in every regional conflict on the planet.

Paul didn’t distinguish himself during the Senate Benghazi hearings when he scolded then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over the confusion that erupted in the firefight at the U.S. consulate in Libya. “If I had been president,” Paul said, he would have fired Secretary Clinton on the spot.

I thought at that moment: Oh … please.

But the man’s occasional quirkiness and interesting take on domestic and international affairs has piqued my curiosity.

With that — run, Rand, run!

 

national news, political news

Here we go: Congress to probe email tempest

It was a matter of time — and it took no time at all — before Congress would decide to conduct hearings into Hillary Clinton’s use of personal email accounts while she served as secretary of state.

Here’s how I believe the inquiries break down: What will they learn? What do they hope to learn?

Boehner reportedly set to announce Clinton email probe

At issue is Clinton’s use of a private account rather than using a State Department email account to communicate with, oh, this or that foreign minister or U.S. government staffers relating to official government activity.

The hearings might enable members of Congress to learn what she said and when she said it, and to whom. The public also might learn whether Clinton divulged national security secrets while using the private account — which is the one thing she said categorically the other day she didn’t do.

House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said — by golly — he doesn’t want to subpoena Clinton. Sure thing, Mr. Chairman. “I’d rather not have to subpoena her, but if she’s fully cooperative there wouldn’t be a need,” Chaffetz told The Wall Street Journal. “Are we prepared to do so if necessary? I suppose so. We’re going to get to the bottom of this.”

Now, what does the Republican-led Congress hope to learn? Only God knows. I’m guessing the leadership hopes to learn something — anything — that is going to damage Clinton’s chances of getting elected president of the United States next year.

That’s how it goes in the world of politics. Something goes amiss and Congress jumps all over it.

If the hearings commence, and I am quite certain they will, be sure to tune in to all the speeches lawmakers will make prior to asking whatever questions they intend to ask. This is a bipartisan tendency. Indeed, as Republicans pontificate over their outrage at what they suspect happened, you’ll hear Democrats blather on about how they are utterly certain this is all a witch hunt.

Get ready for it. The fun is just beginning.

 

national news, political news

In a word, the Hillary email story is about 'trust'

You can sum up the difficulty that is building around Hillary Rodham Clinton’s probable presidential campaign in a single five-letter word: trust.

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/03/hillary-clinton-press-conference-115989.html?hp=b3_r1#.VQaz71J0yt8

Can she be trusted to tell us the truth all the time?

The Politico story attached here talks about the history she and her husband, the former 42nd president, Bill Clinton, had in using the English language to wiggle their way out of difficulty.

President Clinton sought to tell Americans that he “did not have sexual relations” with the young White House intern. It turned out that likely did have what almost anyone describe as a sexual relationship with her — but not in the way he defined it.

Does anyone recall how the president defined the word “is”?

Hillary Clinton’s email mess, on its face, likely isn’t a huge story. It’s becoming one, though, because of her own seemingly slippery use of language to define what she did and when she did it.

The Politico essay refers to her talking about “not saving” email communications. What happened to the word “delete”? Did she delete the messages, send them to the trash bin on purpose?

It’s that kind of imprecise language that seems to be getting the former secretary of state/U.S. senator/first lady into a bit of a jam as she ramps up her 2016 presidential campaign.

Hillary Clinton once seemed like the inevitable 45th president of the United States. She remains the prohibitive favorite to become the Democrats’ next nominee for the office.

That aura of White House inevitability, however, suddenly is needs some major repair.

Straight talk would help build some much-needed trust.

 

national news, political news

No love for Hillary from White House

The late state Sen. Teel Bivins, R-Amarillo, once told me that the Legislature’s decennial redistricting effort gave Republican lawmakers a chance to show how they “eat their young.”

It’s a cutthroat business, carving up a state into equally sized legislative and congressional districts. It has to be done once the census is taking every decade.

Well, it’s good to point out that Republicans aren’t the only ones who “eat their young.” Democrats do it, too.

http://nypost.com/2015/03/14/obama-adviser-behind-leak-of-hillary-clintons-e-mail-scandal/

A New York Post columnist reports that sources tell him that White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett leaked to the press Hillary Clinton’s use of a personal email account while she served as secretary of state.

Where’s the love from the White House? Not with Jarrett, apparently. It remains to be seen if the Post article can be verified by other, independent sources. A part of me isn’t surprised by what the columnist is reporting.

Remember ol’ Willie Horton? He was the murderer whose prison furlough was approved by then-Democratic Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis, who was his party’s presidential nominee in 1988. Then-Vice President George Bush, the Republican presidential nominee, hammered Dukakis mercilessly over that furlough, as Horton went out and killed someone during the time he was set free.

Do you remember who introduced that issue into the 1988 political campaign? It was a young U.S. senator from Tennessee, Democrat Albert Gore Jr., who was seeking his party’s nomination along with Dukakis. Gore ratted out Dukakis in a Democrat vs. Democrat game of insults.

I’m certain my friend Teel Bivins would enjoy watching this latest bit of political cannibalism.

 

 

International news

Iranian hardliners find friends on Capitol Hill

Of all the criticism out there aimed at the Gang of 47 who signed The Letter to Iran, urging the mullahs to reject a nuclear deal with the United States, one point rings truer than the rest.

It is that The Letter has given ammunition to the hardline faction within the Iranian government to use against whatever the so-called “moderates” bring to any discussion on this matter.

Who would have thought that the hardline Iranian Islamic fundamentalists would find allies within the Republican majority that controls the United States Senate?

Roll that one around for a bit.

Freshman Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., drafted the letter and sent it to his GOP colleagues. Forty-six of them signed it, with seven Republicans declining to put their names on The Letter.

They’ve interfered directly with a sensitive U.S. negotiation with Iran over how to persuade the rogue nation to discontinue its nuclear development program. The Gang of 47 well might have broken U.S. law prohibiting such unauthorized negotiation with a foreign power, but the gang won’t be punished for it.

Conservatives think they’re doing the right thing. Liberals are angry with them for undermining the president of the United States, the secretary of state, and our allies who’ve joined us in seeking an end to the Iranian nuclear program.

And, yes, they’ve given the Iranian hardliners reason to smile today as they look toward the United States and see that members of our “loyal opposition” are proving to be not quite so loyal. They’ve turned a bipartisan U.S. foreign policy endeavor into a partisan contest.

The late, great Republican U.S. Sen. Arthur Vandenberg of Michigan, who coined the phrase that partisanship “ends at the water’s edge,” is spinning in his grave.

 

 

 

media news, national news

HRC turns over 55,000 emails; Colin Powell, none

A friend distributed this tweet, from Joe Conason, a liberal columnist who wonders about the Hillary Clinton email flap.

“If Beltway press isn’t satisfied that @HillaryClinton turned over 55K emails, why don’t they care that Colin Powell turned over ZERO?”

I think I know the answer.

Colin Powell isn’t considering a run for the presidency in 2016; Hillary Clinton is likely to declare her White House candidacy in a month, maybe two.

That’s the reason for the interest.

Colin Powell served as secretary of state during the first term of the George W. Bush administration. He used a personal email account, just as Clinton did. In no way does that justify anything, other than to suggest that the media have this way of applying double standards whenever and wherever possible — and against whomever they feel like doing so.

I suppose if Powell, a retired Army general as well, were to decide to run for president, then he’d become fair game, too.

national news, political news

HRC's email tempest is going to build

Oh, how I was hoping Hillary Rodham Clinton would quell the unrest over her use of private email accounts while she was secretary of state.

Silly me. I knew it likely wouldn’t, but I was hanging on to a glimmer of hope.

Her press conference today likely guaranteed this tempest is going to follow her onto the 2016 presidential campaign trail, assuming that she makes the race — which everyone in the know seems to think will happen.

Clinton fails to calm email storm

She said something today about deleting tens of thousands of private emails from her server at home. She said she never breached national security with private communications. Clinton said she used the private account for “convenience” sake and said if she could do it over, she would have used the State Department account to communicate about State Department matters.

Her critics on the right — led by Fox News and other conservative mainstream media — will ensure that this matter keeps bubbling up.

Now, though, her critics on the left are likely to start beating the bushes for an alternative candidate to seek the Democratic presidential nomination next year. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts says she won’t seek the presidency.

Hmmm. Can she be talked into running? I’m betting some operatives are going to try.

This email matter hasn’t risen to the level of “scandal,” as some on the right have called it. But it does raise some questions — in my mind, at least — about whether Clinton kept public information away from public scrutiny.

This mess is far from being cleaned up.